Police Investigate Herald Reporter for Extortion

Mupfurutsa, popularly known as Prince Tendai, according to a report he made to police (docket CR 1069/09), approached CCU officers for protection after the reporter allegedly threatened to publish what he said were compromising pictures of the businessman at a hotel in Nyanga.

“During the last week of August I heard a rumour that Khosa was threatening to expose some compromising pictures and a damaging story of myself. I then called him about the pictures and I told him that I was willing to pay for the pictures,” reads part of Mupfurutsa’sreport in the case.

The Ekhaya Petroleum director told the police that he offered to pay Khosa US$200 for the pictures but the reporter said the money was too little and would not be accepted by the person holding the pictures and the story.

“I told him that I was willing to negotiate the offer once I see the pictures and he told me that he was going to Gweru. I concluded that he didn’t have the pictures since he had mentioned a place I had never been to in recent months and was probably trying to create a story in order to get money from me,” Mupfurutsa told the police.

The court documents also reveal that on September 8, 2009, the same story that Khosa wanted Mupfurutsa to pay money for appeared on the ZimDaily gossip column but there were no accompanying pictures. The story was written by a Memory Khoza.

“The story was full of lies and was damaging my person and again the similarity between the two surnames struck me as very strange,” he told the police.

Following the publication of the story Mupfurutsa said he decided to approach the police for protection.